Coronavirus and Western self-doubt

It feels like in the past few weeks we have walked into another universe. Normal life has been upended. Now we sit at home, endlessly scouring the news and social media for updates on how many coronavirus cases there are, what money we may get from the government to keep us afloat, how long will we have to self-isolate…

It has allowed us a glimpse of what authoritarian life might look like. The Coronavirus Act, for example, weakens privacy protections, imposes greater restrictions on freedom of assembly and association, and grants police, immigration officers and public-health officials new powers to detain indefinitely and to forcibly take biological samples. This will eventually come to an end, but there is always the risk that such transfers of power cast a longer legacy. We must be vigilant.

Talking about freedom is never easy, there have always been those trying to tell us why we must relinquish it ‘for our own good’ – whether that be to ‘stop the spread of hate’ or to stop the spread of coronavirus. It is claimed that arguing against restrictions on our liberty will only sow seeds of doubt at a time when we need ‘unity’, which is a euphemism for conformity.

Forget people’s livelihoods, mental health, social life and liberty – if you do not affirm that an indefinite lockdown is the correct course, then you are akin to an accessory to murder. Apparently.

So, why the unforgiving reaction? I don’t doubt that many are scared but well-intentioned. But this all reveals something deeper, too – a fear of a loss of control and a breakdown of trust, in which forcing people to act is considered wiser than convincing people to act.

This reveals a lack of faith in Western ideals. For years now, we have conceded so much ground to those who have sought to erode our liberty and democracy. And so these measures do not seem like a big step to many. But, of course, they are a huge step. Western values are not a given or inevitable; they are, in fact, fragile, and we must fight for them every day.

How are we differentiating between those who die of Covid-19 and those who die with Covid-19? Journalists and pundits clamber over one another to make definitive claims about the nature, scale and scope of the outbreak. But some of the most important questions get drowned out in the noise.

What’s more, what will our response be when another virus inevitably appears in the future – another lockdown? How will we talk about Chinese state authoritarianism in the future when we have taken similar measures against our own people? Do we need a written constitution, which would guarantee that our rights are protected irrespective of circumstance?

All I know is that we need more debate, discussion and dissent at the moment, not less.

Inaya Folarin Iman is a writer.

Picture by: Getty.

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2nd April 2020 at 12:45 pm

You ask .. ‘how will we talk about Chinese authoritarianism in the future’, we don’t that is the problem, a problem that I sometimes think I’m the only person in the rafters shouting down about.

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NEIL DATSON

2nd April 2020 at 8:47 am

What I find most chilling about the withdrawal of personal liberty is that the demand for it seems to have come from ‘the ground up’, from the people themselves through the media in its sundry forms, rather than to have been imposed on a reluctant people by the government.

Linda Payne

2nd April 2020 at 5:03 am

I beleive the elderly are more tuned in when it comes to freedom; the very old still remember the war and those a few decades younger have tasted a slice of freedom in the 60’s and know what their parents went through; people comply with restrictions if they think its for the greater good; right now it is to combat a virus threat but as the article states it could be anything, we should never ‘get used’ to being watched and monitored

Neil John

2nd April 2020 at 4:59 pm

With the installation of such a panopticon via technology we have in the UK I fear that’s unlikely to ever happen.

Leo Savantt

2nd April 2020 at 1:36 am

Indeed more debate, so:

Do we need a written constitution?

We already have one, it is just that it is not collated into one document, so the real question is should it be consolidated?

Most definitely not, Turkey, Russia and the EU27 all have taken the mono approach to constitutional frameworks, as has Iran and indeed China. Furthermore if the UK were to codify its constitutional arrangements the people who would lead the process, the elites, are the last people in the world to trust to protect our freedoms, for it is they who have just taken them away.